Summary: Rodney gets distracted.
AN: Written for stargateanon. This is set between "The Hive" and "Epiphany", so spoilers up to that episode. Thanks to smuffster for the beta!
Pride's Old Companion
You are in that place where everything is so clear that numbers become flowers of frost, cold and beautiful and melting away if you touch them too long, but you're a genius, your brilliance like a glove, and you pick them right out of that strange place where they're blooming and give them a new home on your screen, fingers dancing on your keyboard as you build up your own secret garden of numbers and variables and-
"Dr. McKay." She interrupts you. And the thought creeps in that something might be wrong with your metaphor, because what the hell does physics have to do with flowers, but you push it away, trying to concentrate even as she steps into the room. You're tempted to ignore her, oh so tempted, but the numbers are already tumbling, the clarity of the moment fading away, and even without taking into account the fact that she could break you in half without breaking a sweat, she has more than earned your respect, your attention. So you turn, because that's how it works, isn't it; you earn something, you get it, and besides, Teyla hasn't been treating you any differently for the last few weeks, and you're kind of grateful for that. Nobody has, really, which doesn't surprise you all that much; you're scientists, you're professionals. Fine, so Elizabeth is still pouting, but that's to be expected: She's a woman, after all, and everybody knows that at a certain time of the month, they often become unreasonable. Not unlike somebody else you could mention, but you won't, because that would mean thinking about him, and like you've never been one to prod a sore tooth with your tongue, you've marked all thoughts of him with a big, shiny 'Do Not Touch'. You might be many things; a masochist, you're not.
Teyla is still waiting for you to answer, patiently, as if she knows your scattered thoughts, and you reward her tolerance with your attention. You don't quite remember the last time you went to bed, so you'll assume it's been a while, but you don't feel tired, not really. Perhaps a little more weary than you usually do, but that can be blamed on a lot of things, lack of sleep not even on top of the list, and it's easy to pull yourself together, slip into the professionalism you've been wearing ever since you got your first degree.
"Teyla. What can I do for you?" Because why else would she be here if not to ask a favour, and yes, she wants to go to the mainland; a friend of hers is in labour, and it is her obligation as a leader to lend her strength and give her blessing or something like that, but all the pilots are busy with something or other, so she's asking you to fly her over. And of course you complain a little at that deliberate waste of your valuable time, but secretly, you're pleased that she even thought of you, since everybody else seems to think that Dr. McKay and straight lines have as much in common as... well, as things that don't. You've never been good at metaphors, evident in that mental road kill of frost-flowers and numbers, but the smile that breaks out when you agree to pilot the jumper can't be described as anything but sunny.
Still, you don't think Elizabeth will let you go, or Carson for that matter, because hello, lack of sleep, and you probably need a break other than a few hours of waiting around, so you're surprised when the two of you get a green light. It's now that you start to get a little nervous; it's the first time you've ever flown the jumper without another pilot as a backup, but Teyla seems to trust you, and Teyla knows people, so you gather all your confidence and pretend you know exactly what you're doing. And to your surprise, you do; in fact it's easy to make the little Ancient vessel react exactly like you want it to, and you're proud you've learned your lessons so well. And a little annoyed at your own surprise: Of course you've learned your lessons, you're a genius - learning is what you do. So maybe the line isn't precisely straight, but you get her where she needs to be, and you don't think your course cost too much time.
And then it's been hours, and the baby's still not there, and you're thinking that you might as well have taken the scenic route and not have missed anything. That's what you hate about children, you're always waiting for them in some way, and sitting around doing nothing isn't your modus operandi. So you check the jumper's systems; perfectly calibrated, just like you expected, not that you'll ever tell Radek as much. And still you're waiting; obviously giving birth takes time, and you can't help but think about other things that do, like, say, learning how to fly a puddle jumper, or earning someone's trust. Not that you're thinking about Colonel Sheppard, oh no, you meant that in a general sense: There must have been a lot of people during the course of history that had to earn someone's trust back, and it probably bears significant... significance.
You just wish that any of them had left a note how long exactly it will take before banter regains its usual rhythm, before mutual assurances of friendship aren't so awkward anymore. Before you will pass a door at night and know that you are welcome in there, like you were prior to screwing up so bad only someone like Oppenheimer could recognise. And-
And of course, now you get the Pegasus equivalent of the Flood, and it doesn't take much thinking to decide between the nice but cold jumper and the nice warm hut. Teyla smiles at you when you enter, and you ask a few painfully embarrassed questions about how it's going, and shouldn't she call Carson if there are complications, but she assures you that, "All will turn out well, Rodney."
Still, sitting in your corner, while that woman moans louder and louder is a previously unknown level of unease, even for you, and then there's screaming, and oh God, she can't be serious. But Teyla is adamant, and so you find yourself holding the hand of a woman whose name you never got, and try to look strong and manly while she does her best to break your fingers; you're lending your strength, when you're really just wishing more and more desperately for one of you to pass out. And then Teyla sticks her hand inside, and there's more screaming, and you're aware that you are babbling, but you continue, although why you're telling an Athosian about the time you were stuck in an elevator with an ape called Bruno and subsequently developed serious claustrophobia you really don't know. Instead, you look away, trying your heroic best to ignore all the blood and talking, talking, talking, until there's a new scream, and the hand holding yours in a death grip relaxes, and hey, it's a girl.
After that, it's cleaning up and smiling a lot and suddenly finding yourself included in the blessing ceremony, which is apparently what lending your strength to strange women earns you around here. You have to hold the child, and you're terrified you're going to drop her and learn about the Athosian equivalent of a lynch mob, but then she looks at you with earnest blue eyes, and you have to smile at the tiny human in your arms. Teyla is watching you, smiling back, and you're quick to tell the women how you were just thankful that the brat can't talk yet, no offence, and could they please not tell anyone on Atlantis? That earns you another smile, mischievous this time, but they agree, so you don't comment. On your flight back, Teyla thanks you for your help, and you're not quite sure what she's talking about; all you did was get your hand crushed while she was pulling out the baby.
Later, you learn that the child was named Rhody.
~~~
"McKay."
You glare at the interruption, irritated; Teyla's little trip has cost you an entire afternoon, and so what if it's quiet right now; the next emergency will come for sure and then they'll be sorry you didn't finish the calculations to speed up the waste disposal process. Or maybe not, and Ronon glares right back, so you ask him nicely if curtly what the hell he wants.
"Do I look like a yellow cab to you?" you ask when it turns out that Ronon, too, has come to ask for the renowned McKay taxi service, and you roll your eyes at the blank look your question earns you. But Ronon hasn't survived on his own for seven years because he's stupid; in fact, the way he heaps up traded coffee rations in front of you can only be called cunning.
"What, you teach the Marines how to kill someone with their toenails, and they pay you with coffee?"
"They pay me a lot of things. Don't like the coffee." So why not give it to you, and that's a line of reasoning you can easily follow. Besides, it's been almost a day since you've last flown the jumper and only practice makes perfect.
You're already better, your course a bit steadier, but perhaps that's due to the three hours of sleep you caught last night. Three, not your desired eight, if only for the reason that somehow you couldn't rest, couldn't shut down, both your body and mind thrumming with nervous energy. It's been going like this for weeks, and you're sure you could put your finger on the reason if you tried, but you don't want to. Instead, you grab what little sleep you can and then go back to work, throwing yourself into the familiar world of physics and engineering, ignoring the way you're feeling cold all night because all you have to warm you is a blanket.
Ronon points you to a clearing, and you land, sure that he'll go off and shoot something and you'll return to the city with fresh meat for dinner. You snort in condescending surprise when Ronon sits down at the edge of the clearing, his back against a tree, and looks ready to commune with nature. But if the big man is willing to pay you a ridiculous amount of coffee just to meditate, you're fine with that.
You're fine with it for about an hour, impressed with your own patience, and then you start to fidget, to pace, because how long can it possibly take to reach nirvana and come back, in tune with the universe? Long, obviously, and Ronon tells you as much when you, not so subtly, start to play with your military standard issue wristwatch, the one with the lid. In fact, he tells you to suck it up and deal with it, so you end up sitting against your own tree, although you have the sense to spread out one of the tinfoil blankets first; everything else is just plain unhygienic. And if you had known you'd spend the day listening to birds twitter and leaves rustle, you would have brought your laptop, or at least a book, but as it is you're forced to wait until Ronon is finished.
What is it with all the waiting, you wonder, and kind of wish that at least Sheppard had come along, because then there would have been someone to talk to. But the Colonel is immensely busy these days, and now it's Lorne who's dropping by the labs for small talk; they really seem to think you don't know they're checking up on your scientists, just in case there might be a problem that needs a gun to deal with. And Sheppard likes to be kept in the loop, you know as much, even if he has taken to avoiding you oh so subtly. You're not stupid; you know there's no necessity for three armoury inventories in two weeks, and so you don't even ask anymore. There are plenty of people to spend your spare time with: Being somewhat intimidating to most of the personnel doesn't mean you don't have friends, and an evening at Carson's usually entails Laura Cadman's surprisingly good cooking. Then there's the Atlantis Mensa chapter, the botanists' battle scrabble nights, or the somewhat untamed parties the anthropologists are organizing every other month, invitation only; and you and Radek have been trying to drink each other under the table ever since his cousin at the SGC started sending Becherovka with the Daedalus - relabelled, of course. If Sam Carter really thinks that sending you to Siberia was a punishment, she... well, she's right, but at least you've built up a soaring threshold for all things alcoholic, and one day you're going to tell Radek that Russian and Czech are similar enough for you to understand at least part of what he's muttering, and the look on his face will be worth every argument you've lost.
Still, Sheppard's avoiding you, and even if he is trying to keep up your bickering on offworld missions, it's strained, a little off, and with a sense of nostalgia you think back at when your friendship was easy, when you didn't have to watch your words, when everything just clicked. That was before you thoughtlessly asked for a trust you had assumed you'd earned and consequently lost it, but he said you could get it back, and you smile a little at the memory of a warm hand on your arm, the one good thing that came out of your last encounter with Ford.
You drift off, lost in the memories of other touches, a different warmth, and when you wake up you're stretched out half across the blanket and half over the forest floor, with a leaf in your mouth and a crick in your neck, and Ronon's finally, finally done, and you get to complain the whole way back. Of course, then you have dinner and he steals your dessert, but he lets you rant about it as much as you want.
You feel better rested than you have in weeks.
~~~
Sheppard offers you a flying lesson two days later, making you almost drop a very delicate piece of equipment at the unexpectedness of his voice.
"I don't need a lesson," you say, although you want it; oh, how you want it.
"Teyla and Ronon said their rides were a bit bumpy," he drawls, and that apparently decides it, because next thing you know, the jumper bay roof opens and you take her out into the sun. Yes, her, since the other pilots agreed that a jumper is much like a car and therefore a woman and you're not allowed to call it 'it', even if the logic is fuzzy to say the least. It's a small consolation that they didn't name them yet, since you're sure Sheppard would take you out in the one that's called 'Christine' just to spite you. Your acquaintance seems to work like that, more of a one-upmanship than anything else, childish glee whenever one of you manages to score another point. And you thought that there was real affection lying underneath, but obviously you're wrong again, for if there had been fondness, surely it wouldn't take so fucking long to get the relationship back on track, would it? Yes, you're bitter; you have every right to be, locked out like this and given the cold shoulder, which is glaringly unfair, as Sheppard's acting like yours was the first mistake in the history of mankind. So yes, you screwed up and he had been mad and righteously so, but you apologised, and you've been trying ever since to get back on his good side, and he just wouldn't let you. He's sitting right next to you, but he seems to be light-years away.
You fly in silence for a while, your hands gripping the controls like your life depended on it, and yes, it does, but usually it would be enough to earn you a comment from Sheppard, but he's just as quiet as you are. Some lesson this is, and the tension keeps building up inside you until you snap, and tell him that he shouldn't think you didn't know exactly what your team is up to.
"Really. Well then, enlighten me," but hah, you won't fall for that, not anymore, because he isn't such a good liar either, and you've spent months learning his body language.
"Oh please, Colonel, spare me," is your answer to his obvious attempt at deflection, and you're grimly satisfied as his eyes narrow. "You carry me off from Atlantis so the only calls I'll get will be the real emergencies, thus ensuring my mental and physical well-being." Sheppard's mouth is a thin line, and you add, "Any more transparent, and you could sell your pretty plan to the next emperor we meet."
And really, it's irritating, the way everyone assumes you can't relax on your own. Disturbingly cute how they worry and try to help you, but very, very irritating: You're not very good at reading people, but these are not just random persons, these are your friends, you know them, and you're feeling a bit affronted at how blind they must think you are. You've been suspicious all along, because there's no way, no way that Sheppard would send Teyla away when she needed him to fly her to the mainland. No way that Elizabeth wouldn't find someone else for Teyla, a trained pilot, someone who's a lot better at handling the jumper than you are, someone who would have gotten her to where she wanted to go in half the time it took for you. And you won't even begin with Ronon and his coffee, you've seen the man trying to meditate, and he's taking to mental stillness as well as - well, metaphor, but it wasn't very convincing. You were curious, that's why you went, and maybe a little grateful, and if anything, the others on your team need the time off at least as much as you do, dealing with addiction and failure and more pressure than any sane person should have to deal with, thanks to Caldwell and his handbook of Proper Military Behaviour. But you won't talk about it if they won't; you've never been first choice material as a confidant, and even if Carson didn't quite get that memo, he's the only one. And anyway, them knowing you needed a break without you knowing doesn't mean they have any more sense than you do, because they needed a break and didn't know but you did, so hah!
There's a flaw somewhere in that logic, but you're not going to poke.
Sheppard doesn't say anything for a very long time, and you're sighing inwardly: If that's how it's going to be, you should have stayed in your lab, for if Teyla's little adventure was distracting and Ronon's newfound love of mother nature got you to unwind a bit, this isn't anything but uncomfortable.
"If you knew it, then why play along?" You have to hide your surprise at Sheppard's question; you thought that the topic was already secured way under the carpet, but he sounds like he really wants to know. Giving you an opening, and you'd be an idiot if you didn't grab it.
"Honestly? Because I feel you deserve the chance to make up to me, for leaving me alone with Ford's lunatics and not even coming back to get me. I'm generous like that."
Predictably, Sheppard snorts, and you hide a little grin as you send the jumper into a wobbly descent, for once not annoyed at being yelled at for your seeming incompetence.
Because it's a team thing, is what you don't say. Because it works both ways. Because you were right, I needed the break, and I'll eat an orange before I'll admit that.
And it occurs to you that all those weeks you've been waiting for him to take the first step, and maybe that's not entirely fair, either.
~~~
That night, you knock on John's door for the first time since Duranda, nervous and nauseous and determined to work for it, to try and get back what you had, because you want it, and it's worth it. Because I missed you, a truth you will never give voice to, but it is there all the same.
He lets you in.
~~~
So sue me. I like second person POV.